Biography

I am Lee Lowenfish, a native of New York City who returned to his home town in 1976. After graduating from Columbia in 1963 I spent five years getting master and doctoral degrees in American History at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. Those were turbulent exciting years and I did my share of reading, learning, and anti-Vietnam war protesting. I always remained a baseball nut because growing up in New York there were three major league teams, two of which were almost always in the World Series from 1947 through 1958 my formative years. Was a Giant fan and only rooted for the Dodgers when they played the Yankees in the World Series. So I am used to pulling for the underdog.

I am the author of four books about baseball. My latest now in paperback is the award-winning Branch Rickey: Baseball’s Ferocious Gentleman (a Bison Book from the University of Nebraska that also published the hardback in 2007.) The book won a Choice award from the American Library Association and the coveted Seymour medal from SABR (The Society for American Baseball Research).

Favorite quotes

“Baseball, jazz and the Constitution are the greatest achievements of the United States.”

–Author Gerald Early

“They call us baseball nuts but they forget that a nut is a very fine fruit.”

–Lee Lowenfish, quoted by Sports Illustrated.

“Baseball is what this country used to be, football is what it has become.”

“Lowenfish’s take is detailed and nuanced.... he doesn’t look for simple answers; despite his own abiding admiration, he never sugarcoats or presents Rickey in anything other than a three-dimensional light.”